New York
US immigration authorities have announced the arrest of a second activist who participated in pro-Palestinian protests last spring at Columbia University in New York City.
Leqaa Kordia, who is a Palestinian and from the West Bank, was arrested in New Jersey, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement on Friday.
The statement said another student, Ranjani Srinivasani, who has Indian citizenship, chose to “self-deport” by leaving the US earlier this week.
This follows the arrest of Columbia campus activist Mahmoud Khalil, who was detained on Saturday in New York before being flown to a jail in Louisiana.
The DHS statement says that Ms Kordia had overstayed her student visa, which had been terminated in 2022 “for lack of attendance”. It did not say whether she had been attending Columbia or another institution.
She had previously been arrested in April 2024 for taking part in protests at Columbia University, according to DHS.
Ms Srinivasan, a doctoral student in Urban Planning at Columbia University, had her visa revoked on 5 March.
“It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study in the United States of America,” said Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in a statement.
“When you advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country.”
Ms Srinivasan’s lawyer Ramzi Kassem told the Wall Street Journal that the government’s statement was “full of the falsehoods we’ve come to expect of DHS”.
Mr Kassem told the paper the government “violated basic rights” by revoking a visa “simply for engaging in protected political speech”.
The BBC contacted a lawyer for Ms Srinivasan for comment on Friday evening.
Contact details for Mr Kodia’s lawyer were not Immediately available.
